American screenwriter Lorenzo Semple, Jr. – best known for his work as co-creator of the classic 1960s Batman television series – has passed away from natural causes at his home in Los Angeles, California, aged 91. Born in New York City in 1923, Semple began his career in the 1950s, writing short stories and stage plays, including the comedy The Golden Fleecing which was produced for the screen by MGM as 1961’s The Honeymoon Machine, starring Steve McQueen.
After moving to Hollywood, Semple collaborated with William Dozier on a pilot entitled Number One Son, which was ultimately shelved due to concerns about having an ethnic lead. However, he would reunite with Dozier in 1965 after being approached to write the pilot episode for a Batman TV series, and subsequently served as story editor on the resulting first season of the series, which proved to be a huge success, as well as the 1966 feature film Batman: The Movie and the television spin-off The Green Hornet.
Following his work on Batman, Semple went on to pen a number of feature films, including Pretty Poison (1968), Papillon (1973), The Parallax View (1974), The Drowning Pool (1975), Three Days of the Condor (1975), King Kong (1976), Flash Gordon (1980) and Never Say Never Again (1983).
